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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28350198">3 2 1 2</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aine_Llewellyn/pseuds/Aine_Llewellyn'>Aine_Llewellyn</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Otherfaith Religion &amp; Lore</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F, Gods, Hurt No Comfort, Original Mythology</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 20:48:57</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>413</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28350198</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aine_Llewellyn/pseuds/Aine_Llewellyn</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Maybe this year, you'll eat her.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Claire Clarice Clarene/Ophelia</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Complete Collection of Otherfaith Fanfic</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>3 2 1 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>You have obligations. Duties. Desire is secondary, a fleeting squirming thing like the worms between, beneath your muddy feet.</p>
<p>The God of Life smiles at you. Crowned in horns and suffused with snow, her cloven wooden feet touch your waters. Her skin is as stunning as leaves in fall.</p>
<p>(You have not seen her head on, direct, intent, since... ...)</p>
<p>"Claire," you greet</p>
<p>
  <s>petulantly.</s>
</p>
<p>dutifully.</p>
<p>Her smile like glass, cracked. Her words unspoken, but you know them the same. Can see her lips curl in your memory, snarling her displeasure, her distaste.</p>
<p>You hide your own paltry attempt at a smile.</p>
<p>"The celebrations start soon," she says, instead of what she wants to say.</p>
<p>Maybe this year, you'll eat her.</p>
<p>She deserves it,<br/>she deserves it,<br/>what</p>
<p>she </p>
<p><em>did </em>-</p>
<p>"Ophelia?"</p>
<p>The fangs of mutiny break in your mouth.</p>
<p>The God of Life and Death sits at the edge of your river. As young and eternal as when you met her. Consuming the hearts of fae and men only to spit them out transformed. Consuming poison only to survive, the toxin transfigured into heavenly balms. Your own heart once held in her teeth,</p>
<p>in her fangs,</p>
<p>until she swallowed you into something new.</p>
<p>"Go celebrate," you say.</p>
<p>She frowns, pouty. Her eyebrows bunched up in an expression that, you recall, once brought you a sweet breeze of joy in your greyscale world.</p>
<p>"I want to go with you," she whines.</p>
<p>A God, whining? What dignity does she have? She rejects duty, she rejects obligation, she chases whatever desire fills her mind, she is as flighty as the airy spirits she condescends, she -</p>
<p>" - should have considered that before trying to kill my children," you hiss like a water moccasin.</p>
<p>Her cloven feet splash in the river.</p>
<p>"...I didn't...mean to," she mutters.</p>
<p>The water of the river wants to surround you. Reach up and cradle you. Ease your worries, ease your fears, eat them away in the waves. The water weaves around your back, up your shoulders, over your ears, covering your eyes.</p>
<p>If you can close yourself, shut yourself down, fade into greyscale again, absolve your conscience into the river, duty and obligation will flow sturdy against the rocks.</p>
<p>"I'm - " she begins to say.</p>
<p>In your hands is the mask of your false feelings. The water drips, and drips, and drips, and still the God of Life and Death does not speak. </p>
<p>" - sorry," she finishes as you snap the mask in your own brittle hands.</p>
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